Possible Accident Waiting to Happen

[twodzusfittings]

On my Hunter 25.5, the Pop Top is held up by one simple slide and twist latch. Every time I put it up and put the latch in place I cringe at the thought of how that would hurt if it let loose and came down on my fingers, hand, wrist or any other body part. I look at it as a guillotine. The latch is just not secure enough for my liking. What have you 25.5 owners done to secure the hatch when up. I have used the vang around the mast, but I was thinking of doing something more easy to lock in place and provide that security. Any thoughts?

 

[Roy G]

I have the same boat and share some of your concerns with this set up. I know that the owners manual says that the pop top is for anchored or docked use only. It's not supposed to be up when sailing.

You could easily run a rope around the mast through the back two legs of the pop top and that would stabilize it better than the slide stop and bent hook arrangement.

Good Luck
Roy

 

[twodzusfittings]

I think I might bolt on two eyes, use an adjustable strap with safety hooks on each end, a stop on the front of the mast as to avoid it dropping. I will try later to attach a drawing.

 

[Mormandeus]

I'm not sure if it would be adaptable to your poptop but Catalina Direst has a kit for the C22 that uses gas struts to take the load off. Might work for you.

 

[twodzusfittings]

Sorry about my inability to draw, but I thought this would give a good presentation of what I thought I might do. Any thoughts?

 

[twodzusfittings]

All it took was a whole day working on odds and ends on the boat to come up with the answer. On each side of the sliding hatch is a grab handle, about 1 3/4" x 1/2" and long (no sure how long exactly). On one side I have the main sail line hooked on to an eye bolt, while the sail in flaked on the boom. So if I were to duplicate the eye bolt on the other side and have a line with a carabiner on each end, then the main sail line could hoist up the pop top and be lock in place by both the sliding latch on the mast and as a secondary safety measure the rope clutch. Absolute genius, even if I say so myself!!!!!

 

[Tom J]

My O'Day 23 Pop-Top had pins that were inserted into the four support struts to hold the top in the raised position. Is that possible on your boat?

 

[twodzusfittings]

Not sure, but i don't think so. The four tubes that support the top when up are fixed with brackets and pins at each end, (top and bottom). I will review your thoughts this weekend when I get down to the boat again.